Japanese Way of Dispensing Prescription Medication

Just giving you a peek at how medications is often dispensed here. Very haphazardly!

My son got sick with a bit of a cold. So his pediatrician gave us five kinds of medication. (Three at bottom shown)

Left bag: Contained gargling medicine

Middle bag: Contained the three meddies at bottom.

Right bag: Contained a fever reliever, only to be used in case his fever became high.

And dispensed in bags!!!! In America (in case you are not American) everything is in these yellowy-orange canisters with child-proof tops. (Can be very dificult to open.)

I am always worried in Japan I will make a big mistake with the meddies. It just seems so free and easy. All the bags look the same, the medicine can fall out of them and get mixed up, and so on.

My husband’s job is researching and doing experiments with prescription medications, so I often call him and tell him the names of the medicines. Then if he does not know about a particular medicine, he will research it.

By the way, according to my husband, Japanese medicine tends to be a lot weaker than American medicine. He thinks American medicine is generally too strong. Just his opinion. Extra strength is not always better.